MANACOR, August 31, 2018
Bernard Tomic headlined Friday’s quarterfinal action at the Rafa Nadal Open Banc Sabadell. The No. 6 seed in Mallorca defeated Norbert Gombos from Slovakia 6-3, 6-4 under the floodlights at the Rafa Nadal Academy.
Tomic sent down seven aces and capitalized on four of his 10 break point opportunities to prevail after one hour and 15 minutes.
“Night session“ at @rnadalacademy headlined by Bernard Tomic, who is seeking his first title since 2015 this week. pic.twitter.com/c91FOF1LbC
— Florian Heer (@Florian_Heer) 31. August 2018
“Norbert has beaten a lot of good players and he played pretty well today, so I had to play a good level of tennis today. I was down 1-3 in the first set but I managed to turn this around, winning five or six games in a row. It was a good match,” Tomic told Tennis TourTalk after reaching the semi-finals.
“It is a beautiful academy here, well done, well organized. Rafa did a great job here and it is unbelievable to be here. I thing that not many academies can match this and I am happy to came here this week.”
Tomic met Rafael Nadal just ahead of the ATP Challenger hard-court event in Manacor, while playing the qualifying at the US Open.
“Rafa is a good friend of mine. We played doubles before and we played singles many times. I told him that I will come to the Challenger, which has been organized for the first time here. It’s a beautiful week for me.”
Three more semi-finalists
Tomic, who is seeking his first title since lifting the ATP World Tour trophy in Bogota 2015, will next take on Kenny de Schepper of France, who eased past Daniel Brands from Germany 6-1, 6-2 in one hour and four minutes.
Enrique López-Pérez
Earlier in the day, Matthias Bachinger knocked out No. 1 seed Thomas Fabbiano of Italy 3-6, 6-2, 6-2. The 31-year-old German struck seven aces, winning 70 per cent of his first service points to secure victory in one hour and 48 minutes.
In his first semi-final since Eckental in November last year, Bachinger will face Enrique López-Pérez, the last Spaniard standing in Mallorca’s singles draw. The No. 7 seed from Madrid beat compatriot Nicola Kuhn 6-1, 7-6(8), who didn’t manage to come back this time. López-Pérez outpointed the teenager 87-73 in one hour and 37 minutes.
Unpredictable outcome
To predict the final two contenders for the crown of the inaugural Rafa Nadal Open Banc Sabadell seems to be pretty hard. “We have a German, a French, a Spanish player as well as Bernard Tomic, who is maybe the one the people come here to cheer for. But we have seen a lot of great matches this week so far and we are looking forward to interesting semi-finals,” tournament director Joan Suasi said on Friday.
